Passport Rules, Part 2

Geese walk along the snow covered waterfront park through heavy snowfall as the first winter storm of the season hits the area in Portland, Ore., Thursday, Dec. 8, 2016. (AP Photo/Don Ryan)

Monday morning delinquent daughter packages up her paperwork and ships it via high speed express to the passport expediting company. They are promising one day turn around time, so with one day to get there, one day to process, and one day to return, she might have her new passport by Wednesday.

Wednesday afternoon it starts snowing. In parts of the country where snow is a regular seasonal occurrence, that might not be such a big deal, but here in Portland it only snows when it will most inconvenience ME. Evening rush hour is a disaster. What would normally be a 30 minute commute turns into two hours.

Thursday schools are closed. Roads are covered with ice and snow. If you are careful, you can go places. Traffic on the roads is light because most people have enough sense to stay home.

We're expecting the new passport to arrive via FedEx, but it doesn't. Come dinner time dutiful daughter is in full panic mode. Tracking the package reveals that the delivery was aborted, no other explanation given. She finally resorts to pushing the zero button on the phone repeatedly until she gets connected to a real person, and after a few minutes of gentle persuasion they reveal that the package is at the Swan Island shipping center. It is 7:15 PM. They close at 8. Google Maps estimate travel time to be 25 minutes. (Really? With all the ice and snow?) We decide to go, maybe we'll be lucky.

Once we have gotten to well traveled places, the roads are pretty well clear of ice and snow. We see a couple of cars in the ditch, one has turned turtle. Oddly, the section of Highway 26 near the intersection of 217 has the most snow and ice. That's weird because that is usually where the traffic is heaviest.

It's a little nerve wracking driving at moderate freeway speeds on roads with dubious traction, but we don't have any trouble, not even going down Going Street towards Swan Island, or coming back up, even though it appears to be covered with ice. I suppose the sand trucks have been there.

Now all we have to do is get to the airport.

Part 1 here.